Get That Life: How I Became a Photographer for National Geographic

Photographer Cristina Mittermeier has camped at the South Pole, gotten close enough to a grizzly bear to smell its breath, and was almost eaten by a whale. She started her career as a biologist, using data to help preserve natural ecosystems. But when she picked up photography as a hobby while she traveled — to more than 100 countries — a new purpose took shape. Now one of the most prestigious conservationist photographers in the world — with credits including National Geographic, Science, and Smithsonian magazines, as well as co-founder of her own ocean conservation group, SeaLegacy.org— Mittermeier uses her photography as a way to spark conversations about conservation, sharing her unique view of the world with everyone who has the power to help save it.

I grew up in the mountains of central Mexico. My dad decided I would go to his alma mater and I would be an accountant like him. I was a very obedient, good Catholic girl, so I went along with the plan. Then my senior year in high school, [a college recruiter] visited and started talking about a campus in Northern Mexico on the Gulf of California where one could study marine biology. He showed pictures of kids tagging whales, going on fishing boats, and working in the ocean. I went, Aha, that’s exactly what I want to do.

Christina at Abrolhos Marine National Park, Brazil.

Paul Nicklen

But when freshman year came, I was too afraid to leave my mom and my home, so I attended a school nearby. By the end of the first year, I had straight As and felt very unchallenged. I felt more confident to be on my own so I moved 2,000 miles north to study at the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education.

Another catalyst for making this change was a book by Paul Ehrlich called The Population Bomb [which in 1968 predicted global destruction due to human actions]. When you grow up in a country like Mexico that is overpopulated and has such big issues with poverty and hunger and unemployment, you really feel the effects we have on this planet. My goal in studying marine biology was to participate in solutions to alleviate poverty and help my country.

My mother was my champion. She has a Ph.D. in psychology, and is very educated and well traveled. She told me to go for it.

Christina diving in Quintana Roo, Mexico.

Cristina Mittermeier

After I graduated in 1989 [with a degree in] biochemical engineering in the exploitation of marine resources, I got a job at a hotel in the Yucatán Peninsula to do a biodiversity assessment. The owner was the father of a friend of mine and he wanted to create a biological reserve around his hotel property in Akumal, Mexico. In order to do that, he needed to understand the type of biodiversity that inhabited his property. I spent six months diving, running around the jungle, playing with monkeys, and drawing butterflies.

While I was there, a team of scientists from a new organization called Conservation International came through the hotel. They were surveying the effects of a hurricane that happened a couple years before and how the ecosystem was recovering. I took them on tours of the area. I explained the changes I had seen and they were impressed. They hired me right then and there.

Kayapo children playing in the river.

Cristina Mittermeier

They had just opened offices in Mexico City and they brought me on to be a technical associate. I worked on a project studying the Lacandon Jungle and another project that took me back to the Gulf of California to study the effects of big fisheries. I also learned the financial aspects of conservation, such as where the money comes from, how to fundraise and work with governments.

It was in doing that work that I met the president of Conservation International, Russell Mittermeier. After I had been working with the organization for about a year, he came down to Mexico City from Washington, D.C. Three months later, we were married.

It was a whirlwind romance. He was almost 20 years older than me and the most interesting man I had ever met. Very reluctantly, my mother agreed to this marriage. I offered my resignation to CI in 1990, before I got married, to prevent a conflict of interest.

Swimming with manatees in Three Sisters Spring, Florida.

Courtesy of Cristina Mittermeier

I didn’t work for about six years. I spent all my time traveling with my husband and participating in very high-end meetings with heads of state, the environmental community, and attending enormous conferences like the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change or the Convention on Biological Diversity.

I never knew I had an ego until my work was attributed to someone else.

While I was learning a lot during these trips, I felt very much left out of the conversation. Russ is a great man so he started inviting me to publish in scientific literature with him. My work appeared in the most prestigious journals for any scientist to publish in, but more importantly, I learned how to write in proper academic English.

I started carrying cameras on my trips around the world. I knew nothing about how a camera worked or how to take photographs, so I taught myself. I read books about photography and learned everything I could about composition.

A Kayapo warrior. This is the photo Christina took that was attributed to someone else.

Cristina Mittermeier

The first photograph I ever published was by accident. I was on a trip with my husband in a remote village in the Amazon and I snapped a couple of images. When we came home, the Houston Museum of Natural Science was doing a very large exhibit on Amazonian art. They asked for photographs from Conservation International and we sent a box of slides. We came to the opening of the exhibit and I realized they were using one of my photos for all of the exhibit materials. It was credited to my then-husband.

I never knew I had an ego until my work was attributed to someone else. It felt awful. That motivated me to go back to school. I was 28 with three kids at home, feeling like a lot of moms do: I just wanted to get out of the house. I went to night classes for about two years studying traditional darkroom, printing in black and white, color process printing, and Photoshop. I didn’t care about a degree; I just wanted to learn more about what I was interested in.

Two young girls from the Vezo seminomadic people of western Madagascar drag a small net across the shallow coastal waters of Morondava.

Cristina Mittermeier

I realized photography was a powerful way to start conversations about conservation so I started donating the images I would take on my trips with my husband to Conservation International. Pretty soon, they recognized the value in what I was doing and with board approval, they hired me as the senior director of communications.

I started to attend nature photography conventions, and I realized most photographers didn’t engage in environmental or conservation issues. They were all talking about filters and f-stops and how to photograph grizzly bears. I would raise my hand and ask, “How can we inspire conservation groups with our images?” I was basically told to shut up and sit down. Environmental groups at the time — the late 1990s — were seen as really negative, polarizing things.

Antarctica.

Cristina Mittermeier

I decided to start my own foundation, the International League of Conservation Photographers. I had to create bylaws, complete an application for nonprofit status, recruit board members, and hire a lawyer and an accountant. Most importantly, I had to come up with a mission statement and figure out exactly what the purpose of the nonprofit would be. My mission [was to make] the argument that communications and storytelling are critical to the advancement of conservation.

Within two years, we were raising money and sending photographers [including myself] all over the world to do conservation work. We had mostly wealthy individuals passionate about nature donate to the organization and then major foundations started to contribute. As president of the organization, I am pretty closely involved with all aspects of our work, from financials, to proposals, to creative work.

Any fear that I have is trumped by the responsibility I feel to give nature a voice.

In 2010, after 22 years of marriage, I got divorced. My kids were teenagers and I was living on my own in Washington, D.C. I had a relationship with National Geographic at the time because of my work in conservation photography. In the cafeteria of Nat Geo, I met Paul Nicklen, probably the best underwater photographer in the world. We started dating and soon I was going with him on assignments for National Geographic.

For the first few assignments I became his assistant but he really championed me as a photographer to National Geographic. In 2014, I started contributing my own work. I had published images in many other magazines around the world but being published in Nat Geo is a real privilege. It tells you that you are one of the best in the world.

Christina diving under waves in Makaha Beach, Hawaii.

Paul Nicklen

The first 10 to 15 years of my career as a photographer were very terrestrial. When I became Paul Nicklen’s partner, he took me into the ocean, where I always wanted to be. Underwater photography comes with a whole new set of challenges both technical and physical. You are always at risk of drowning. The ocean is beautiful and fantastic, but when you’re photographing things like whales and sharks, you are at great exposure.

There was no training. I simply bought the equipment and got in the water. The rest has been a lot of trial and error, a study in frustration and a lot of Googling. I have relied on what I know about shooting above water and Paul has helped me understand some of the underpinnings of technique.

Overexploitation of queen conch all over the Caribbean has led to a moratorium in exports by CITES. In Honduras, stocks are depleted but local fishermen still gather them for local consumption. Gracias a Dios, Honduras.

Cristina Mittermeier

On one assignment, Paul and I were swimming with orcas in the Norwegian Fjords in the dead of winter when all of a sudden, I feel the water displace. I look down to see these two humpback whales coming straight up at us with their mouths wide open. This is an animal that is bigger than a school bus. We furiously started kicking backward and got out of the way in the nick of time. That would have been a painful way to go. For a while I was afraid of whales. But any fear that I have is trumped by the responsibility I feel to give nature a voice.

We live in a dangerous planet but we shouldn’t allow our fear to stop our dreams.

The hardest part of the job is the fitness aspect of it. You spend a lot of time in boats, get fed a lot of high-calorie meals, and there is not a lot of time to work out. But I need to be strong enough both physically and mentally to rescue myself from a situation. I practice yoga and Pilates when I can to keep my body strong.

Photography on its own is a very difficult source of revenue because you are always a freelancer. There is absolutely no job security, no benefits, and no health insurance. It was my dad the accountant who taught me to have a portfolio of activities to support myself. I do a lot of writing and public speaking, and I derive a lot of revenue from publishing conservation books.

Greenland.

Cristina Mittermeier

I may have another 10 to 15 years of this type of work. It’s increasingly difficult to travel to these remote places, sleep on sea ice, and lug around all this equipment.

My plan is to travel to where the ocean and people are colliding in interesting ways. Places like Kiribati, where the waves are already invading people’s homes and a migration to other countries has begun; Bangladesh, where seawater is flooding people’s fields and robbing them of their livelihoods; and places like Mexico, Fiji, Miami, and others where the threat of increasing storm powers is bringing governments and people to their knees. I will be using my entire set of skills, as a portrait and travel photographer, a nature photographer, and as an underwater photographer to tell the story of the 1 billion people who live at the water’s edge.

Hawaii.

Cristina Mittermeier

I think as women, from the time that we’re very young, we are taught to listen to these little voices that tell us we’re not supposed to be doing this, or that we should be afraid, or we’re not meant to accomplish this. Silencing that peanut gallery is the most important thing that we can do. We live in a dangerous planet but we shouldn’t allow our fear to stop our dreams. I know that when I am a little frightened, I am in the right place.

This post has been updated to reflect that Mittermeier is also the founder of SeaLegacy.org.

Get That Life is a weekly series that reveals how successful, talented, creative women got to where they are now. Check back each Monday for the latest interview.

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